(2) Many of the Morris and Sword dancers have evolutions which are characteristic of ceremonial used by savage people in the worship of the sun. The Abingdon (Berks) dances, a very old tradition, end with a complete circle. Bean-setting, one of the Headington (Oxon.) dances, begins with two half-circles danced in opposite directions. The Bampton dances have circles, half-circles, and gypsies, another form of circle. The Gloucestershire dances have the same. In some dances the dancers advance and retire into the centre, forming a widening and narrowing circle alternately, all of which illustrate by mimetic action the supposed movements of the sun and the sun’s rays. All were probably actuated by mimetic magic, primitive man believing that by imitating the rising and setting of the sun and by lighting fires he actually caused the return of the sun to the earth. (3) The appearance in different forms of the King and Queen, the Lord and Lady, the Mayor and Squire in the ceremonial of the dance. These figures indubitably link up the dances with those ceremonies attending the crowning of the King of the Wood, who, representing the life of the earth’s vegetation, was yearly slain lest his vigour might wane and all the green life of earth perish with it. The slaying of this King and the revels which preceded it and the crowning of the fresh and younger Monarch were all still dimly to be traced in many revels and dances in English villages within quite recent years. At Abingdon, the story runs, two hundred years ago a great fight took place between the dwellers in Ock Street and the rest of the burghers of the town. The Ock Street people outnumbering the rest of the whole town thought they had the right to appoint a Mayor. A beast was slain in the market-place and roasted whole, a fight took place for the horns, and the winning side then carried the horns in the Morris dancing round the town. The horns are in existence to-day and are carried by the Mayor of the Morris accompanied by the Squire carrying a Sword. There are traces left still of the gold used to tip the horns which are mounted on a bull’s head, with flaming red nostrils, thus making it evident that the beast was regarded as sacred. These ceremonies took place on St John the Baptist’s Eve, celebrating the summer solstice. [Illustration: Abingdon Dancers, whose tradition goes back to 1700 (_“The Squire” holding the sword, wooden cup, and collection box, also the pole on which is mounted the bull’s head and horns formerly carried by the “Mayor of the Morris”_)]